Sword and shield. (Clinton, Miss.) 1885-1888, 1887-01-22

to the eng, sweet or D!tteE III we are going
to be knocked on the head, all have to say
is that l hope we shall get little shooting
first-eh, Good@
Yes, yes," put in the captain. I'VE have
all three of us been accustomed to face dan
ger, and hold our lives in our hands in va
rious ways, SO it is no good turning back
now."
sAnd now | vote we go down to the sa-
loon and take an observation, just for luck,
You know" And we did-through the bot
tom of a tumbIer.
Next day we went ashore and l put Sir
Henry and Captain Good up at the little
shanty have on the Berea, and which ca.l
my home. There are only three rooms and
a kitchen in it, and it is built of green brick
with galvanized iron roof, but there is
good garden with the best loquot trees in it
that know, and some nice young mangoes,
of which hope great things. The curator
of the botanical gardens gave them to me.
1t is looked after by an old hunter of mine,
named Jack, whose thigh was SO badly
broken by buffalo cow in Sikukunis coun-
try, that he will never hunt again. But he
can potter about and garden, being Griqua
by birth. You can never get your Zulu to
take much interest in gardening, 1t is a
peaceful art, and peaceful arts are not in his
line.
Sir Henry and Good slept in tent pitched
in my little grove of Orange-trees at the end
of the garden (for there was no room for
themin the house, and what with the smell
of the bloom and the sight Of the green and
golden fruit-fOr in Durham you will see all
three on the tree t0gether-I dare say it is a
pleasant place enough for we have few
mosquitoes here unless it happens to come
an unusually heavy rain).
Well, to get on-for unless l do you will
be tired of my story before we fetch up at
SuliBlans Notwithstanding once made up
my lAind to go / set about making the
necessary preparations First | got the deed
from Sir Henry, providing for my boy in
case of accident. There was some little
difficulty about getting this legally executed,
as Sir Henry was stranger here, and the
property TO be charged was over the water,
but 1t was ultimately got over with the help
of a lawyer, who charged go for the job-a
price that thought outrageous Then got
nv cheek for e50O. Having paid this tribute
to NY bump Of caution, bought wagon
and a span of oxen on Sir Henry's behalf
and beauties they were. 1t was twenty
two-foot wagon, with iron axles, very
strong, very light, and built throughout OF
stink-wood. 1t was not quite new one
ssh4ving been to the Diamond Fields and
Z, AAs. but in INV opinion it was all the bet
ter for that, for one could see that the wood
was well seasoned. Ii anything is going to
give in a wagon or if there is green wood in
it, it will show out on the first trip. 1t was
what we call .half-tented'' wagon, that is
to say, 1t was only covered in over the after
twelve feet, leaving all the front part free
for the necessaries we had to carry with us.
LIN this after-part was a hide ''cartle," OF
bed, on which two people could sleep, also
racks for rifles, and many other little con-
veniences. l gave 9125 for it, and think It
was cheap at that price. Then | bought a
beautiful team of twenty salted Zulu oxen,
which had had my eye on for a year or
two. Sixteen oxen are the usual number for
team, but | had four extra to allow for
casualties. These Zulu oxen are small and
light, not more than half the size of the
Africander oxen, which are generally used
for transport purposes; but they will live
where the Africanders will starve, and with
light load will make five miles day bet
ter going, being quicker and not SO liable TO
get foOtSore.
What is more, this lot were thoroughly
'salted," that is, they had worked all over
South Africa, and so had become proof
Comparatively speaking) against red wa
ter, which so frequently destroys whole
teams of oxen when they get on to strange
'veldt" (grass country AS for lung
sick" which is dreadful form Of pneumO-
MIA, very prevalent in this country, they had
all been inOculated against it. This is done
by cutting a slit in the tail of an OK, and
binding in piece of the diseased lung OF an
animal which has died of the sickness. The
result is that the OK sickens, takes the dis
ease in mild FORM which causes its tail to
drop off, as rule about a foot from the
root, and becomes proof against future at
tackS. 1t seems cruel to rob the animal of
his tail, especially in a country where there
are so many flies, but it is better to sacrifice
the tail and keep the OK than to lose both
tail and OK, for tail without an OK is not
much good except to dust with. Still ii
does look odd to trek along behind twenty
Stumps, where there ought to be tails II
seems as though nature had made trifing
mistake, and stuck the stern ornaments of a
lot OF prize bulldogs on to the rumps of the
oxen.
Next came the question of provisioning
and medicines, one which required the most
careful consideration, for what one had to
do was to avoid numbering the wagon up,
and yet take everything absolutely neces-
sary. Fortunately, it turned out that Good
was bit of doctor, having at some period
in his previous career managed to pass
through a course of medical and surgical in
structiOns, which he had more or less kept
up. He was not, of course, qualified, but he
knew more about it than many man who
could write NJ D. after his name, as we
found out afterward, and he had splendid
travelling medicine chest and set of inStru-
ments. Whilst we were at Durham he cut
off Kafr's big toe in way which it was a
pleasure to see. But he was quite flabber-
gasted when the Kafir, who had sat stOldily
watching the operation, asked him to put on
another, saying that white one' would
do at pinch.
There remained, when these questions
were satisfactorily settled, two further inn
povtant points for consideration, namely,
that of arms and that of servants. AS to the
arms l cannot do better than put down a
list of those we finally decided on from
among the ample store that Sir Henry had
brought with him from England, and those
which had. / copy it from my pocket
book. where made the entry at the time.
s'Three heavy bree"hlnadinO dnnhia-ni"ht